


Moments

by Awakening5



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Force-Sensitive Finn, Friends to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-22 16:30:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7446019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Awakening5/pseuds/Awakening5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"All of those little moments, they all pointed here. Curled up with Finn, wishing the Force could freeze time. That this moment could last forever."</p><p>The moments that defined how friends became more, and perhaps always were more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moments

**Author's Note:**

> I had a long, perhaps book-length, story floating around in my head. Unfortunately, I'm not really in a good space to write one of those at this time. But the Finn and Rey development I had foreseen was too good to pass up. So I picked select scenes that I had envisioned to tell a much shorter, much simpler story of these two. Hope you enjoy!

I should have seen it coming. Where it was always headed. It was always going to end up here.

I let my fingers slide up his bare chest, strong and broad. At the touch, he turned his tired eyes to mine, and a smile formed on his lips. He reached up and grabbed my hand and brought it to his mouth, pressing small kisses to each finger in turn. He turned my hand over and kissed my palm before leaning into my touch.

I couldn't take the smile from my face if I wanted to. But why would I ever want to? It had always been leading to this, even if I hadn't chosen to notice. All of those little moments, they all pointed here. Curled up in bed with Finn, wishing the Force could freeze time. That _this_ moment could last forever.

-0-0-0-

"We came back for you," Finn whispered fiercely, and I felt my heart swell inside of me. Someone came back...no one ever came back.

Chewie added to Finn's declaration, and my eyes stung with emotion.

"What did he say?" Finn asked after glancing back at Chewie.

I paused for just a moment, still letting the news process. "It was your idea." I don't remember ever hugging anyone. My whole life I'd been alone. I'd never trusted anyone enough to touch them, much less embrace them.

But I _had_ to hug Finn, and it was the most natural thing in the world. He had been ready to leave—leave the fight, leave the Resistance and First Order far behind and go to the Outer Rim.

But he came back. For me.

-0-0-0-

I didn't want to leave him. Not after he'd come back for me, and nearly died doing it. But something was happening, something had awakened in me. Something bigger than me. I had to go to Luke.

But right up until the moment I had to leave, I was at Finn's side. I talked to him about the Force, and its otherworldly power. I told him about life on Jakku, and how I had become the best scavenger at Niima Outpost. I confessed that I'd never felt comfortable with people, because most of my interactions with people was competitive in nature. But I was comfortable with _him_. 

He was unconscious, perhaps not hearing a word I said. I knew I'd gladly repeat myself when he woke up.

"We'll see each other again," I said when I knew my time was up on D'Qar. "I believe that." 

And I did believe it. Something had awakened in the galaxy that was bigger than us, but somehow this was important. And it felt important even despite—or perhaps because of—that awakening.

I pressed my lips to his forehead. It was an unfamiliar gesture to me, but one that felt right.

-0-0-0-

Luke was a great teacher, and I was a willing student. Aside from occasional distracting thoughts of Han Solo or Finn, I thought I was doing pretty well. And then one day, two weeks after finding him, I felt something across the galaxy. It was unlike any of the other things I'd learned in the Force to that point.

"He's awake! I can feel it!" I was giddy with excitement. The excitement had much more to do with Finn's awakening, and much less with this newfound ability to sense something hundreds of light years away.

Luke had a small smile as he appraised me. I wanted to feel a little self-conscious about my jubilation, but I couldn't bring myself to feel anything but joy. "Can you feel it, too, Master?"

Luke shook his head, the small smile still shaping his beard into a much-less imposing feature of his countenance. "I've never met the boy," he said, and tilted his head. "But he's either sensitive to the Force, himself, or he made quite an impression on you. For you to feel him so easily."

Embarrassment managed to displace my joy just a bit as I flushed and looked away from my teacher. "Maybe both," I said softly, for the first time entertaining the idea that Finn may have been part of the same awakening as me.

Luke grew serious for a moment. "We still have much to do before we return, Rey. Are you going to be okay with that?"

I reached out with the Force again, and _felt_. He was alive. He was awake. He was in pain, and troubled. Not knowing what I was doing, but trusting the Force, I tried to project myself across the galaxy. And I felt him relax. He was still in pain, but he was oddly content. So I was, too.

"Yes, Master."

-0-0-0-

It was another two months before I saw him again. During that time, my ability to feel him came and went, usually dependent on his own emotional levels. Only at his most painful or joyous would his presence reach out enough for me to grasp.

Luke was always patient in those moments, when I would lose all sense of purpose just to reach back to him. To comfort or smile. I always wondered if he felt me, if he knew he was feeling me.

But as the ramp of the Millennium Falcon lowered on D'Qar at long last, there was no doubt that we felt each other. Our eyes met and a wave of the Force swept through me, and I saw recognition in his eyes.

We gravitated to each other quickly, and I only vaguely recognized the rest of the Resistance celebrating Luke's arrival. I sensed Leia's simultaneous sorrow and joy, but it was in the back of my mind that I processed it. Because most of my focus was on Finn, who walked toward me tenderly, his back still sore with pain.

"Rey," he said as we met at last, a smile spreading across his wonderfully expressive face. "You came back!"

I wound my arms around his neck, careful to avoid his healing wound. His own hands wrapped around me quickly, and he pressed his forehead to mine, still smiling.

"Of course I came back," I whispered to him.

"It's been you I've been feeling, isn't it?" Finn asked. "Now that you're here, it's so clear."

"So you can sense me, too?" I asked, though he had already answered that question.

"Leia and Maz have been really helpful. They've helped me understand what I've been feeling." He leaned back in our embrace, eyes scanning my face as if trying to memorize it. It would have felt obtrusive if it wasn't _him_.

"I don't think I could have stayed away for as long as I did if I didn't feel you," I admitted.

He smiled broadly again. "Well then I almost wish I didn't have some measure of the Force." His tone was joking, but the thought that he'd give up the Force to see me made my heart swell. 

"It's really good to see you again, Finn."

"And you, Rey."

We perhaps hugged for too long. But who were we to know the standards of hugging? We just knew what felt good, and somehow, we knew what the _other_ person felt was good, too.

-0-0-0-

Luke had seemed more than a little disappointed, but I was beginning to understand why Finn turned down his offer to train him. 

"I just don't think I can deny myself attachments," he told me in a quiet moment as we walked through the forest of D'Qar, hand in hand. He looked at me with meaning.

"I don't know how much Luke adheres to that particular teaching," I commented lazily, not wanting to dwell on his look. "Just look at how he interacts with Leia, or his sorrow over Ben and Han. He's very attached."

Finn looked away from me. "All familial attachments," he said softly, as if arguing his point, before moving on. "Besides, it just doesn't _feel_ right for me. Just like I prefer a blaster to a saber."

I nodded. "At least Maz has offered to teach you how to use the Force, even if you won't give yourself to its service."

Finn nodded. "It's already been such a revelation. For years, I've wondered what was wrong with me, why I was so unique to the other Troopers. To think it was the Force, keeping me _myself_ amongst all the propaganda and reconditioning."

I squeezed his hand. "I'm so grateful it did. I can't imagine where I'd be right now, if you hadn't found me."

"You'd be beating up bad guys with a stick," Finn said, nudging my shoulder. "Did I ever tell you how _badass_ you looked the first time I saw you?"

I grinned at his praise and nudged him back. "Not half as _bad_ as you looked when I knocked you _on_ your ass."

He laughed before glaring at me good naturedly. "I was dehydrated," he defended weakly. "And confused at why this beautiful girl would be chasing me to aggressively." I blushed at his words, and he winked at me before continuing. "I should have realized she couldn't possibly be chasing me for a good reason, but to hit me with a stick."

-0-0-0-

Finn's training with Maz was much less structured, and focused more on what Finn thought would be _cool_ , than based on any ancient learning passed down over thousands of years. As a result, he was free to go on missions without his teacher, while I was never far from Luke.

"I'm sensing a pattern of distraction, Rey," he told me one day, a few days into one of Finn's departures.

"A pattern, Master?"

"You become distracted more easily when Finn is away. You understand the concern of attachments now, do you not?" His face gave no indication of his feelings on the subject, and his heart was well guarded from her probing with the Force.

"Perhaps it is the attachment that _helps_ me," I said cautiously. "After all, it's when he's _near_ that I succeed in the more difficult aspects of my training."

Luke smirked. "Beware of twisting truth to fit what you _want_ to believe."

"Yet you counsel me to be observant and learn from my feelings and experiences," I countered. It was strange how desperately I wanted my closeness to Finn to be a good thing, and not a distracting one.

"And I am glad you're doing it, Rey. But always approach your doubts from this perspective. Why did the Jedi teach no attachment for hundreds of years?"

"And why did they all die?" I argued before I could contain myself. "Were the Jedi without fault?"

Luke let out a sigh. "Careful, Rey. Be patient in your discoveries, and do not lean on your own understanding too heavily."

My eyes narrowed at him. But I took his advice and paused. Rather than trying to prove to _him_ what I was thinking, I decided to meditate more on it, and keep an open mind. It was only after long moments of silence that I realized Luke had never said I was wrong.

Perhaps there was a chance. Perhaps attachment was not inherently a path to the Dark Side. Perhaps the Jedi had adopted the practice because on a general level, it was a safe way to live. And perhaps Luke wanted me to discover it for myself in a way that would be safe.

And perhaps, one day, I could find out why I so desperately wanted attachments to be okay.

-0-0-0-

It was our second mission together. Our first had been rather boring, where we merely scouted a new planet for its potential as a new base for the Resistance. It had been safe internally, but had very little to offer as natural protection from the First Order.

This mission was anything but boring, seeking to infiltrate a First Order outpost in the western sector. The initial plan had been to get in undetected and disable power and communications.

We had not gone undetected.

But that's why they sent a Jedi (in training) and the deadest eye shooter with Force abilities in the Resistance. If things went south, they could still get out.

We had successfully disabled communications and shut out the power before they had found us, so we wandered through the orbiting station off the planet Pendooine in the dim lights of the backup generator. Stormtroopers' loud voices would have been enough to track and destroy them even without our Force abilities to sense life in isolated space.

I would rush at the Troopers, igniting by lightsaber at the last possible moment to keep them blind in the station as long as possible. Only after my lightsaber lit the area would Finn unleash his dual-wielding fury, as blaster fire rained down on the unsuspecting units.

It didn't take long for us to develop a strong bond in our battle, each knowing exactly what the other would do.

Unfortunately, we let our success cloud our senses and judgment.

As it turned out, the loud Troopers were merely a distraction, an attempt to keep us from using our senses to feel out our enemies' location.

I felt goose bumps form on my arms at the sound of a Trooper blaster from behind me, but when I turned around, the blast was frozen in mid air. The red light rippled in front of my face, and I looked up to see Finn, his hand outstretched and sweat on his face. The tactic he had learned from Kylo Ren had saved my life.

He had been hit by another shot in the back, and I could feel his use of the Force to contain the damage. Through my panic for his safety, I managed to gather my wits and move out of the path of the plasma energy threatening to kill me. I dashed at the new enemies, a pack of twelve more troopers. Behind me, the laser Finn had held in place resumed its path and killed my previous Stormtrooper target.

I could feel Finn's strength fading, but I knew I had to remove the threat before I could help him. Even in his weakened state, he still fired at Troopers and deflected their own attacks. Soon, I had dismantled the remaining Troopers and turned back to Finn. He was held around the neck by an First Order officer, a gun pointed at his head, his own blasters at his feet. Finn didn't show fear, but rather frustration at his capture. 

"I'll kill him if you move," the officer said. I knew that he knew there was only one way he got out of this alive. And that meant Finn had to be alive. The question was whether he valued his own life enough to not do anything rash. 

Then again, one look at Finn and I knew exactly how this would end. He winked at me with a slight smile. His gun fired from at his feet, laser coming straight at me. I was ready, and deflected the blast with my saber right back at the officer. It went by Finn's ear, striking his captor right in the face. He was lifted slightly off his feet and fell to the ground, dead.

He had been true to his word, of course, and fired his own weapon at the first movement. Finn had been ready, and contained the blast within the weapon with the Force. However, the energy ripped the blaster apart and pieces of metal ripped through the air.

Using the last of his concentration, Finn managed to deflect most of the shrapnel. A piece of metal cut a deep gash on the underside of his chin, and he collapsed to the ground, energy gone out of him.

"Finn!" I heard myself shout, and I rushed to his side. I don't know that I had ever experienced such fear in my life, despite living most of my young life in a constant state of it. And I knew in that moment, that _nothing_ would stop me from saving his life.

-0-0-0-

The Force had preserved him. I had been able to keep his injuries contained with my own power while getting him to our escape vessel. I reached deep into my fear of losing him and anger at the enemy to tap into the Force necessary to keep the laser's impact from doing further damage to his vital organs. I held his whole body in a stasis that kept him alive while allowing no infection or bleeding out to claim his life.

I took him to a seedy part of Pendooine where I'd easily swayed a weak-minded healer to look after him. 

Hours later, bacta gauze wrapped around the blaster and shrapnel wounds, Finn awoke. While sore, the damage done was healed rather easily. He had done a good job of minimizing the initial damage of the blast, and I had done the rest, no matter where I had gone internally to make it happen.

"You got us out," Finn said softly as his eyes fluttered open.

Relief flooded through me at the sound of his voice. Though I knew he'd be okay after just a few minutes with the healer, the fear had never left me. And I sat for hours fuming at my arrogance, at my lack of concentration that let us be attacked from behind. It mixed with a secret emotion as I gazed on his sleeping and shirtless form in front of me, chest rising with careful breaths.

"You saved us," I said, knowing it was Finn's protection that had allowed our escape. I'd be dead without him.

Finn tried to sit up. Initially, I made to stop him, but he glared at me, so I helped him up instead. I shifted next to him on his bed and lifted him up while he got situated better. I kept my hand in his chest, liking the feel of his skin on my fingertips. He rolled his shoulders, testing out the wound in his back. I felt the relief flow off of him in waves as he recognized the minimal damage. Having been through a much more severe back injury, he knew the difference.

He glanced at my hand on his chest, then his eyes met mine again—I forgot how close we were—this time charged with something else entirely. Something we'd kept hidden for a long time behind hugs and held hands. The excitement of our successful mission, the fear of a terrible price, and the relief at its actual cost swirled around us.

The pull was so strong. The energy in the room dangerous. I wanted him. He wanted me. And we both knew it. His breath was hot against my face, as his eyes moved from mine down to my lips. My own breath came out in short bursts, my hand moving up to cradle his face, careful not to touch his tender, newly-healed chin.

"Rey," he said softly. Desperate with want.

But I was a Jedi. And he was Finn, _far_ too respectful of me to start something if there was but an ounce of indecision.

And there was but an ounce, because we were scared, and we were emotional, and nothing good ever came out of that.

-0-0-0-

"Your pattern of distraction has vanished, Rey."

I was surprised at Luke's words. I thought I was more distracted than ever. "Thank you, Master," I answered, though, grateful he had _somehow_ not noticed.

Luke raised an eyebrow. "That was certainly not a compliment, Rey."

Oh. 

"Your last mission with Finn..." Luke started. He never finished.

I shuddered. "Let's just say you were right about attachment. It is dangerous."

Luke tilted his head and peered closely at me. Sometimes I wondered if he could read my thoughts without me even feeling the prod of the Force. Or perhaps, he didn't need the Force. "Odd, I haven't seen you with him since your return."

It's true. We had avoided each other like the plague since our return two weeks earlier. To have been so close...and to come away empty. It hurt, and I couldn't deny the longing. In my weaker moments, I let myself feel him elsewhere on the base, and the longing was mutual.

I was embarrassed, but I trusted Luke. "The temptation is strong, Master. I don't know that I can be around him without my feelings growing stronger."

Luke remained calm. "What happened to the girl trying to convince me that wasn't a bad thing?"

"She felt fear," I said. And just the mention of it brought that horrible feeling back into my gut and the image of Finn shot and bloodied. It had been nearly crippling, and I hated to think what my choice would have been if the options had been saving Finn or saving the galaxy. "And I used it."

Luke frowned. "We all feel fear. Yoda feared, Obi-Wan feared. And sometimes we give in, and we use it. It is a great paradox that the Jedi teach to remove ourselves from emotion. For it is emotion that makes us choose to become Jedi in the first place. 

"It was the utter despair of discovering my parentage that brought me to my ultimate dedication to the Jedi Order. And until this point, it was your feeling of belonging that brought you to my tutelage."

I stared at him for a long moment, trying to decipher his true message to me. "You're saying that the Jedi are wrong? Hypocritical?"

Luke shook his head sadly. "I'm saying we teach the extreme because it would be dangerous to teach you that using that fear is fine, so long as you come back from it. But that extreme teaching is _also_ dangerous; it drove my father _to_ the Dark."

I groaned. "So what, nothing you teach me is true?"

"I'd like to think everything I teach you has truth," Luke said with a coy smile. "And you get to discover what applies."

-0-0-0-

I found Finn later that night. He was in his room, reading a book at his desk. He had surely sensed me coming, but he didn't turn around when I entered his room.

"I want to apologize," I said.

"There's no need," he answered, voice tight. "I overstepped my boundaries. I know what you've decided to become, and I shouldn't have put you in the position to go against that."

"I was in that position long before that day, Finn," I admitted, and finally he turned around.

"I don't know if I can be around you without...you know," he mumbled. "Wanting more."

"And I don't know if I can ever be happy without being around you," I said sadly.

Finn nodded. "Me either, actually."

"So...we try to go back, to the way things were?"

There's a feeling in the air, like we both are hearing Yoda's words. Do or do not. There is no try.

And surely we will "do not."

But we nodded and smiled at each other anyway.

-0-0-0-

It had been months, and I thought we had pulled it off. Sure, there were the lingering looks. We no longer held hands, because now that seemed to mean more than it used to. And we weren't as open as we used to be. I remembered when Finn was unconscious after his fight with Kylo Ren, and I had talked to him about anything and everything under the sun. I occasionally wished for those days again.

But aside from those occasions, I was happy that I could be with my best friend again, even with an ever present cloud hanging over us. Sometimes we forgot it was there, and that's when it was all worth it.

We had just finished a new mission—just the two of us, for the first time since Pendooine. We were on a recruiting mission to a recent First Order-acquisitioned planet. There had been plenty of people against the union with the First Order, and Finn and I had been sent to put out feelers for how many there were.

While there, we had protected a small rebel band from a group of Troopers.

Fortunately for Finn and me, the leader of that band of rebels was a master chef, and the planet of Bendii Minor was well known for its culinary variety and grandeur.

We were all smiles as the Millennium Falcon burst into hyper speed and we gathered at the hologame table with a pile of foods that our inexperienced taste buds salivated over. We dug in, savoring the exquisite new tastes we'd never known from our lives of rations.

Hungry, we ate in relative silence, but for the smacking of lips and the occasional groan of approval—always accompanied by pushing the offending food to the other for testing. But as our hunger faded, and the eating became more an exercise of discovery, we began chatting playfully. And the cloud of our history faded—we were just Rey and Finn again, friends enjoying each other's company.

"No," I said, feeling my face scrunch up as I tried a particularly bitter vegetable that Finn recommended. "No, no, no." His peals of laughter proved that he had known the sample was not good. I swatted his arm, feigning anger. He merely brushed off the weak blow and reached for a pastry.

"Sorry," he said without any remorse, still smiling widely. "This will take care of that bad taste."

"And why would I trust you again?" I asked playfully.

He merely leaned forward and pressed the delicious-smelling pastry to my lips. I took a small bite, but my eyes remained on Finn. His own gaze softened as he watched my lips. It was as good as it smelled, but I wasn't paying much attention to it anymore.

"That's good," I said through my food. I anxiously looked at our assortment of sweets, and grabbed one I knew Finn hadn't tried yet. For some reason, I really wanted to reciprocate his gesture.

I lifted a cream puff to his lips, which I watched with fascination as he bit into the desert. Neither of us seemed to be breathing, with our new, strangely intimate actions. Cream from the inside of the treat smeared across his upper lip, and without much thinking, I ran my finger over his mouth to wipe it off.

I was not a wasteful person, having grown up licking my plate when I was done eating. So it was only natural for me to lick my finger clean afterwards. Finn let out the lightest of sounds—one might even call it a whimper. We were already sitting close, but he slid even closer and lifted a hand to my cheek.

"Rey," he said again, as he had months earlier as a wounded soldier. He leaned in carefully. How had the mood turned so quickly?

But this mood was so wildly different from when he was injured and we were desperate. There was no fear, anger, or triumph in the air. Our emotions were much purer, much simpler. He was Finn, my dear friend. The only man in the galaxy I trusted entirely.

Finn waited patiently, because that's who he was. He was so good, and so filled with Light, that I couldn't think of the danger. And maybe there wasn't any.

So I kissed him. 

-0-0-0-

It was a new hunger that had filled us this time, and because we were already so in tune with one another through the Force, we fed off each other's passion. It escalated quickly, and we were both okay with it. More than okay. We were elevated to a place we'd never known before.

But there was a moment in the elation. We had made it to the quarters of the ship. The bed was thin, but with Finn's naked body on top of mine, we didn't need much room. Pleasure had replaced any pain that came with the new experience, as Finn learned from my moans and the emotions he felt radiating off of me.

But just as the elation was peaking, Finn slowed for the briefest of moments. I brought my previously thrown-back head up to meet his eyes, no doubt questioning his torture with my gaze. We were both breathing hard, but he looked deep into my eyes with his own lust-clouded eyes. 

"Rey," he rasped in a strangled voice. "I love you. So much."

My eyes stung with the weight of his words. Words I'd never known. Words that I only understood in this moment.

I leaned forward and kissed him gently—such a contrast to our actions for the past several minutes. "I love you, too."

And I felt such Light surrounding us, I knew what Luke had been trying to convey to me with his questions and cryptic comments. Attachment was not Dark—in fact, it _was_ the very Light that the Jedi fought to preserve. And perhaps, if done correctly, discovered healthily, it could be the very thing that preserved the Jedi.

-0-0-0-

It was always going to end here. My naked form pressed against his, tracing meaningless shapes on his chest as he held my wrist and ran his thumb over my hand. All the moments we had shared pointed here. It was a wonder it took me so long to admit it and accept it.

"Will Luke stop training you?" Finn asked, and I felt concern emanating from him. Whether he was worried I'd choose the Jedi path over him, or if I'd have to give up the Jedi path because of him I wasn't sure. But his concern was nice nonetheless.

I shook my head and kissed his shoulder. "I think he's been trying to guide me here," I said.

Finn turned his head sharply. "What do you mean? He's been telling you to sleep with me?"

I laughed and smacked his chest. "No, sicko. He's been trying to teach me the proper avenues of attachment. Help me realize when _this_ is okay. When this is good."

A smile formed on Finn's lips, making me want to kiss him again. "And it _was_ good."

I nodded, my own smile refusing to drop. "Yes. Yes, it was."

And perhaps the Force could not freeze this moment. But I memorized his smile, the feel of his skin against mine, and the way I felt. I'd never known such happiness and belonging could exist. I stored the information away for safekeeping, ready to be recalled at any time. Then, maybe, this moment could last forever.

**Author's Note:**

> My one major regret in not pursuing the lengthier, and more fleshed out, version of this story is that I really wanted to explore Finn's choice to develop his Force sensitivity outside of the Jedi Order. Can't you just imagine him, dual-wielding blasters, bending lasers around allies and into enemies, generally badassing in the battlefield? Maybe I'll write some more of that, because I think it would be so cool...
> 
> Anyway, let me know what you think!


End file.
